The present invention is directed to audio synthesizers, specifically music synthesizers, and more specifically modular music synthesizers. A sound synthesizer (often abbreviated as “synth”) is an electronic musical instrument that generates electric signals (waveforms) which can be converted to sound by loudspeakers or headphone speakers. Synthesizers can imitate musical instruments and/or generate new sounds.
Synthesizer circuitry generally includes an array of electronic components, such as amplifiers, oscillators, AC or DC power sources, filters, frequency generators, envelope generators and controllers, mixers, multiplexers, phase shifters, phase distortion circuits, frequency choppers, and signal dampers.
Synthesizer signal processing can include subtractive and/or additive signal processing, frequency modulation, wave-table signal generation, sub-harmonic signal mixing, signal phase distortion, and low frequency, mid frequency, and high frequency separate signal manipulation. Subtractive synthesis filters waveforms in selected frequency ranges. Additive synthesis adds waveforms to the signal in selected frequency ranges. Frequency modulated (FM) synthesis changes the frequency and/or amplitude of a signal carrier frequency.
Early synthesizers were only analog circuits which used analog signal detection and manipulation, including implementing analog computer algorithms to generate and output signal envelopes. With the growth in the digital circuit industry, digital synthesizers were introduced which operated according to digital signal processing (DSP) algorithms. The synthesizer programming and control input devices remained relatively the same, i.e., keyboards, knobs, and switches, though the numbers of knobs and linear faders were often reduced in number in order to reduce costs. The advantage in providing digital circuitry in synthesizers, as opposed to analog circuitry, is the same as for other products, i.e., reduction in power consumption, reduction in size, and eventually, reduction in costs.
Modular synthesizers preceded keyboard-based instruments, and continued to be developed, albeit as more expensive, complex, and often esoteric instruments than keyboard-based synthesizers. A modular synthesizer is an electronic unit comprised of “modules” which are connected together by way of patch cords. Voltages from modules may function as audio signals, control signals, or indicators of logic conditions. Each module is built to perform a specific function or several functions and nothing else. A module may have its own active controls, or it may be a slave module with predetermined operational functions. Examples of modules for a modular synthesizer are units dedicated to act as one of the following: voltage controlled oscillators (VCO), white, pink and low frequency noise generators, low frequency, mid-frequency, and high frequency oscillators (LFO, MFO, HFO), complex power sources providing ADSR contours or envelopes (attack, decay, sustain, release), voltage controlled filters and amplifiers (VCF, VCA), mixers, modulators, and sequencers. These modules are selected/built and interconnected to build an audio synthesizer system with desired capabilities.
With progress in personal computers (PC) and software development (software programming techniques), software synthesizers (softsynth) were introduced. Softsynth is a computer program, implemented in downloaded software, or in a pre-programmed plug-in device, to enable a PC to provide digital audio generation under the control of the PC keyboard and mouse. Advances in PC-CPU design and processing speeds allow softsynth to create a desired audio output as with analog and digital synthesizers. Softsynth software is written for specific operating systems, such as Win98, Win XP, Win 7, Apple® MacOSX.
Early audio synthesizers were built as simple circuits with a narrow scope of functions and limited abilities. Today, commercially available audio synthesizers are typically either very simple or very complicated. There are very few products available having intermediate technology. As a result, a novice who starts on a very simple unit is often intimidated when he/she begins to step up to more complicated units.
Modern synthesizers defy exploration by an untrained explorer. Simply sorting out a signal chain is not immediately intuitive or gratifying. Debugging a sound is difficult for most new users. A neophyte cannot approach any modern hardware (or most software) synthesizers and come to a rapid understanding of how to create a sound. Electronic musicians understand that the most basic signal chain involves a keyboard triggering an oscillator which produces an audio signal that is fed to an amplifier. But producing pleasing sounds takes more than this. By the time one possesses the skills to design a synthesizer, the principles of sound chains are so deeply entrenched that they are tacitly considered a prerequisite to approach the instrument at all, and anything simple enough to draw in a novice will be unsatisfying to an experienced artist.
That situation is amplified when it comes to modular synthesizers. As beautiful as they are, these instruments are daunting even to those with some knowledge of synthesis, and they typically have prices that will discourage hobbyists and semi-professional explorers. While softsynth units are affordable the cognitive barrier persists and problems of ergonomics remain: the Cartesian paradigm of the mouse is inappropriate to manipulate rotary controls and softsynth control panels, commonly shrunk to fit into a computer screen, lack the immediacy, tactile characteristics, and real world quality of a physical instrument.
An objective of the present invention is to provide a synthesizer that almost anybody, from a novice to an experienced electronic musician, can approach in an intuitive and flexible manner.
Another object is to provide a synthesizer built from a plurality of hardware modular units, which synthesizer can be configured by the user, who can arrange the physical positions, and insert or remove modules.
A further object is to provide hardware modules that can be connected without external wiring.
An even further object is to provide a synthesizer which is expandable in functionality and complexity, being expanded by the user.
An additional object is to provide a synthesizer which can be implemented as a softsynth unit which appearing to operate as a hardware unit to the musician user.